Your flight or train is delayed, and you may not reach your hotel until late at night.

Check your hotel’s check-in time, then tell the hotel you’re arriving late.

There is no single late check-in time that applies to every hotel. What matters is whether the hotel knows you are still coming and whether someone will be available to check you in.

Check your booking first

Open your booking confirmation and look for:

  • check-in time
  • latest check-in time, if one is listed
  • front desk hours
  • any late-arrival instructions
  • hotel contact or messaging options

If the hotel has a 24-hour front desk and your booking does not show a special check-in restriction, arriving late may be straightforward.

But don’t assume that applies to every property.

Tell the hotel you’re arriving late

If you know you will arrive late, send the hotel a message through your booking platform or contact the hotel directly.

Tell them your approximate arrival time and ask them to keep the booking.

You can send:

您好，我今天会晚到，大约晚上11点到酒店。请帮我保留房间，谢谢

Hello, I’ll arrive late today, at around 11 PM. Please keep my room. Thank you.

Change the time to match your actual arrival.

If possible, keep the hotel’s reply.

Pay more attention if you’ll arrive after midnight

After midnight, your arrival is now on the next calendar day even though your booking started the day before.

That makes it more important to tell the hotel you are still coming.

Some booking systems and properties have no-show procedures for guests who do not arrive on the scheduled check-in date. Your own booking conditions determine what happens to your reservation and any charges.

Don’t assume that a prepaid room will automatically be held all night just because you have already paid.

Your delay gets worse? Update the hotel

If you told the hotel you would arrive at 11 PM but a flight or train delay pushes that to 2 AM, send another message if you can.

You do not need to explain your whole journey.

The useful information is:

  • your name
  • booking number
  • that you are still coming
  • your new estimated arrival time

You’re already late and never contacted the hotel

Check the booking status first.

If it still shows confirmed, contact the hotel immediately and tell them you are on the way.

If the hotel says the booking has already been treated as a no-show or cancelled, contact whoever sold you the room and ask what can still be done with the booking.

Don’t make a second booking until you know what happened to the first one.